CHAPTER XV.—“Jesus the Prophet, whom the faithful call Ruh’Allah.”

It has been told me for a fact that when the exiled Khedive Ismaìl Pasha (known to London street-boys of the period as old Ishmel Parker) was at Naples, one of the officers in attendance on him challenged an Italian in a _café_ for having dared to insult a Prophet of his (the Egyptian’s) religion. The man had been blaspheming, it appeared, as only a Neapolitan or a Tuscan knows how to blaspheme, heaping foul epithets on the name of his Saviour and the Blessed Virgin. A duel, my informant assures me, actually took place on these grounds.